Outside the glass room Alvin was in, a group of scientists were observing him as he lay on the bed.
Even though the room appeared to be a mirror from Alvin's perspective, the doctors could see him clearly from outside.
"CR6, conduct a full body scan on Subject 321," John said to the floating football-like robot beside him once he got out of the glass room.
The two blue eyes of the robot blinked twice. "Establishing connection to the four nodes of the observation chamber..."
The next second, from the four corners of the glass room, four similar robots like the floating ball robot floated up and hovered above Alvin in a square formation.
"Connection established successfully. Initializing scanning..." the football-like robot said mechanically, and the four robots hovering above Alvin released a red light from their eyes like scanners.
Alvin lay there motionless, still unsure how to interpret the whole situation.
Outside, John took out a digital tablet and, after looking at the data shown on the screen, he said to the old scientist beside him, "Chief, all the cores have dropped in rank from the initial SSS rank to B rank, and the core compatibility is close to zero. According to our previous observations, Subject 321 should not have survived."
The old doctor's excited expression slowly faded away from his face when he heard this. "Compatibility is zero? How is that even possible?"
John expressionlessly swiped his fingers across the tablet and said, "His body is only attracting darkness mana particles, but the absorbed mana is not reaching the core. As for the rest of the elements, the mana is not even entering his body."
"What kind of analysis is this? Although this kid had not practiced magic before, his previous core did have compatibility with all the elements. Even if the compatibility is low, it should not have been zero..." a skinny looking scientists said in disbelief.
One of the lady scientists shook her head with a frown. "That is not the important point. Despite his body rejecting the integrated cores, he is not dead. If we can provide him with some assistance, we might be able to link the cores to his body..."
John glared at the lady and said coldly, "It's already a miracle that he somehow survived. His body is in a very frail state right now. If we try to break down his genetic structure any further, it won't be called an experiment anymore. That is a brutal slaughter."
The lady scientist just shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly. "Researcher John, don't try to give yourself a good guy card. Everything we did until now is against the moral code, if you look at it that way."
John's hands shivered for a moment. He forcefully calmed his rising heart and continued scrolling through his tablet.
After some time, the old scientist who remained silent until now suddenly said, "John, introduce Subject 321 to PR rays at 0.5 percent intensity and report me his readings ."
John's face stiffened when he heard this. He looked at the old man hesitantly. "Chief, he won't be able to tolerate such a high-intensity radiation..."
The old scientist's face hardened. "Researcher John, this is an order. I am not asking you whether to do it or not. Do as I say."
John stared at the old man expressionlessly. He stuffed the tablet into the lady who suggested this idea and walked away, ignoring the old man whose face was now red with anger.
"Alin, start the procedure and make a report on John's disobedience later. From this day on, you will take over as the head of Team A," the old scientist said to the lady angrily.
Alin smiled like a cunning fox. "As per your orders, Chief..."
She then said to the floating robot calmly, "CR6, introduce Subject 321 to PR rays at 0.5 percent intensity and report the feedback per second."
The blue eyes of the football robot glowed after receiving the order. The four subordinate robots floating above Alvin extended metallic arms and held Alvin's hands and legs firmly.
"Huh?" Alvin blinked confusedly. He didn't understand why these robots were pinning him to the bed, but the next second Alvin got the answer.
The glow in the four robots' eyes flickered for a moment before they continued scanning Alvin's body like before.
But this time Alvin felt a slight burning sensation all over his body, as though he were standing under the sun on a summer day.
As time passed, Alvin felt an unbearable itching all over his body, as though millions of ants were crawling over him. His skin also reddened at a visible rate.
"Arghhh..." Alvin tried his best to break free from the mechanical arms that were pinning him to the bed, but despite being able to twitch his body, he couldn't even shake the mechanical arms.
"Chief, his body is making antibodies to counter the radiation. I think we have to increase the intensity," Alin said calmly to the old scientist after observing the readings on the tablet.
The old scientist nodded calmly. "Slowly increase the intensity. Stop at the point where his cell structure starts to collapse. If his body is making antibodies to counter PR rays, we have to forcefully mutate his cells to make them accept the cores."
Alin hesitated when she heard this. "Chief, should I use some sedative to make him unconscious? This pain is going to be more than what a human could handle."
The old scientist shook his head. "No need. He has to be awake during the whole process. Only then will his body feel threatened and mutate itself to fight against the radiation."
Alin nodded. She slowly increased the intensity of the radiation bit by bit while closely monitoring the readings shown on the tablet.
Inside the glass room, with every passing second Alvin was experiencing excruciating pain all over his body. He could not even think of anything at this moment. The only thing that remained in his head was pain... unbearable pain...
"Aragghh..." Alvin's screams rang continuously in the glass room. His body twitched uncontrollably on the bed, but no matter what, the pain only kept increasing...
The scientists outside watched the struggling Alvin inside the room with indifferent eyes. To them, this was just the struggle of a lab rat. But what nobody noticed at this moment was that Alvin's purple pupils were slowly turning blood red in color at a very slow pace, indicating the arrival of something scary that no one ever expected...